The conspicuous absence of examination questions concerning the Great Irish Famine: political economy as science and ideology *

To advance our general understanding about the development of nine-teenth-century Irish political economy in the wake of the Great Irish Famine (1846–51), this article analyses the Famine's impact on a previously unstudied, yet uniquely authoritative, element of the displine: the questions given to candidates for the Whately Professorship of Political Economy at Trinity College, Dublin from 1832 to 1882. This article concludes, contrary to previous arguments, that the Famine did not fundamentaly influence the discipline's development, and relates this conclusion to debates over whether and how political economy functioned as an ideology in shaping policy responses to the Famine.     

Uchronies and the History of Economic Knowledge*

The international community of historians of economic thought is not essentially divided between ‘absolutists’ and ‘relativists’, or between ‘continuists’ and 'discontinuists Rather it is the specific content of the métier d'historien which makes the difference. This paper aims at highlighting and systematizing the features characterizing the work of innovative historians. Some of these features are represented by analyses concerning:

1 the intersections between pre-theoretical categories;

2 enunciative homogeneities/heterogeneities;

3 the formation and decomposition of social knowledge;

4 schools of thought

These different research practices are then unified under the common label of ‘uckronies’ (possible albeit non-arbitrary histories). Lastly, some implications of this interpretation are examined. One of them is particularly important: i. e. the irreducible ambiguity of the historian of economic thought vis-à-vis the economist. On the one hand, the former may hermeneutically discover new and valuable ideas from an intellectual viewpoint, but, on the other hand, the ways in which these ideas can enrich economic theory are absolutely uncertain. This ambivalence, together with the ‘scandalous’ trans-disciplinarity of the concepts and instruments employed by the historian of economic thought, may explain the diffidence of the economists towards the new tendencies of historiography.     

The last generalists

Abstract

The general trend of research specialisation in economics has contributed to the marginalisation of the history of economic thought. However, it has also led to a state of fragmentation in the profession and thereby increased the costs of neglecting the history of economic thought. This paper argues that historians of thought can help to counteract fragmentation because they are special generalists that fulfil multiple functions, for example, in the education of economists, the detection of blind spots in modern theories and the identification of routes for innovation by backtracking.     

Habits of Thought and the Process of Economic Development: Remarks on Receiving the Veblen-Commons Award

Among the many insightful contributions of Thorstein Veblen and John R. Commons is that habits of thought matter. Habits of thought condition policy and place limits on what is possible. This article tackles five habits of thought that inhibit the process of economic development. These include: (i) the confusion of economic development with economic growth; (ii) the crowding-out hypothesis; (iii) the concept of the steady state economy; (iv) the peak oil hypothesis; and (v) the inevitability of economic progress. None of the discussions in this article are intended to minimize the importance of other very real constraints to the development process. A few of these other constraints are war, racism, sexism, political instability, corruption, and climate change.     

The neglect of comparison income: An historical perspective

Abstract

Theories of social comparison have a long presence in the social sciences and have provided many useful insights. In economics, the idea of comparison, aspiration or relative income belongs to this theoretical framework. The first systematic usages of this notion can be found in the works of Keynes and Duesenberry. After these works the concept was relatively ignored by orthodox theorists until its recent re-appearance, mainly in the fields of labour and macroeconomics. To the contrary, however, income comparisons continued to play a role in much of Keynesian inspired and non-mainstream economics literature. In the past few years it has made a strong comeback in the literature of job satisfaction and of the economics of happiness. This paper attempts to trace the development of the concept in the modern history of economic thought. It also discusses the main theoretical implications of adopting income comparisons and possible reasons for its relative disregard by orthodox economics.     

Do Educational Attainments Influence Attitudes Toward Gender Equality in Sub-Saharan Africa?

Abstract

Although there is a plethora of literature on gender equality and women empowerment, studies on whether (and to what extent) educational attainments affect people’s attitudes toward gender equality are lacking. This is particularly true for Africa, a mostly male-dominated continent. In this article, we use data from the Wave 6 of the World Values Survey to empirically examine the relationship between educational attainments and attitudes toward gender equality among people in 5 countries in Africa–Ghana, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. Our results, based on different measures of gender equality and econometric specifications, consistently reveal that the higher the level of education acquired, the more liberal and favorable the individual’s attitudes are toward gender equality.     

奠基时期中国经济思想史研究的成就与地位

文章将1897-1949年间的中国经济思想史研究作为该学科的奠基时期。鉴于奠基时期的学术研究对后续研究的重要影响,以及学术界对该阶段研究的不足和对其评价肯定得不够充分,文章从学术史研究的角度出发,围绕研究成果、学术争鸣、学术价值以及研究特点等方面系统地阐述了奠基时期中国经济思想史研究的主要贡献与历史地位,并对经济思想史学科的发展提出了一些针对性的建议。     

中国近代研究经济思想史的方法论特点:以梁启超为例

梁启超是中国近代最早较为系统地研究中国古代经济思想的人。他的相关论著以西方经济理论为参照,为中国经济思想史学科的建立创造了条件。他的研究存在着观点跳跃和逻辑矛盾的现象,这种现象在此后中国经济思想的发展过程中仍然延续。文章在方法论的层面,从传统文化的角度对此进行了新的解析。     

Some Reflections on F.A. Hayek's The Sensory Order

Though F.A. Hayek is principally known for his work in economics, he also made contributions, both positive and critical, to the field of psychology. His most important piece in the latter field is his 1952 book, The Sensory Order. This paper attempts to locate The Sensory Order in relation to some of Hayek's other works. The origins of Hayek's interests in psychology, as revealed by an early student paper that provided a starting point for his later book, is noted. We then examine what may have motivated Hayek some 25 years later to return to psychology. Finally, the larger role that the book came to play in Hayek's overall system is explored. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Political economy and the ‘modern view’ as reflected in the history of economic thought

This paper focuses on the transition from classical political economy to ‘modern’ economics, a central aspect of which is the ascent of the conception of ‘theory’ as a mere instrument of research. We analyse how this transitional phase was perceived and interpreted in representative, more or less contemporaneous histories of economic thought: those by Luigi Cossa in 1880, by John Kells Ingram in 1915 (originally published in 1888), and by Charles Gide and Charles Rist in 1915. Despite their differences, all authors share the same conception of the structure of scientific laws, as well as the view that economics must be separated from liberalism.     

Tyranny of kindness: Dismantling the welfare system to end poverty in America Theresa Funiciello

The Comment on Wrenn’s article “What is Heterodox Economics?” suggests that the inability of heterodox economists to define their field arises from an as yet unrecognized and different metaphysical foundation than that of orthodox economics.     

Bringing them alive

Abstract

This paper continues an ongoing reflection on the ways we do the history of economic thought, marked some decades ago by Mark Blaug. It offers a non-canonical typology comprising three alternative approaches, distinguished on the basis of the way they conceive of the link between statements, old and contemporary: the extensive, the retrospective, and the intensive approaches. It shows that the latter potentially challenges contemporary knowledge by introducing statements which do not belong to it. Despite its being a heuristic, it appears as a privileged route by which the history of economic thought can begin to engage with economic theory.     

Comment on “What is Heterodox Economics? Conversations with Historians of Economic Thought”

The Comment on Wrenn’s article “What is Heterodox Economics?” suggests that the inability of heterodox economists to define their field arises from an as yet unrecognized and different metaphysical foundation than that of orthodox economics.     

Readings and translations of Karl Marx in Portugal (1852–1914)

This article presents an original and critical inventory of the most significant surveys, citations, discussions and translations made of Marx's works in Portugal up until the First World War.

The paper stresses the academic and political conditions under which Karl Marx's ideas were received in a European semiperipheral society and the specific interpretations that were made of those ideas.

It allows for the possibility of undertaking future studies comparing other national cases.     

The participant observer in the formation of economic thought Summa Oeconomiae Perlmanensis

This essay addresses issues related to the History of Economic Thought, Comparative Economic Analysis, and Institutional Economics alluded to in Mark Perlman's “The Character of Economic Thought, Economic Characters, and Economic Institutions”. Specifically, some differences between the strands of American Institutionalism and Schumpeterian economics are brought into focus. Against the background of a review, the ideas of a major participant in the historical analysis of economic thought are discussed. The conclusion is that an evolutionary approach to economics would benefit from any attempt to substitute systematic-discursive theorizing for the received genre of an abstract-deductive approach.     

An Unfortunate Alignment of Heterodoxy,Nationalism, and Authoritarianism in Putin’s Russia

I address the urgent need to deal with the deliberate misuse of heterodox criticism of neoliberal policies in modern Russia. State-funded propaganda has been using distorted institutionalism to rationalize both authoritarianism and nationalism as a left-wing response to global neoliberalism and as a welcome manifestation of civilizational plurality. To help western heterodox-institutionalists offer an informed critique of what Vladimir Putin’s apologists have made of some heterodox ideas, I discuss the particularities of the history of Russian post-Soviet economic thought, and explain who these apologists are and what their training is. I also clarify how, in post-socialist Russia, it has become possible to successfully misappropriate the institutionalist emphases on the significance of culture and history in socio-economic development, and on the active role of the state in a market economy for narrow ideological purposes. In my conclusion, I emphasize strongly that traditional institutionalism is not compatible with oppression and authoritarianism.     

The fault line of axiomatization: Walras' linkage of physics with economics

Abstract

Economists have often aligned the field of economics with physics; in the process seeking to enhance the rigor of economics by mathematizing it. In the late nineteenth century there was no more ardent champion of this view of what economics should become than Leon Walras. His own writings, though, betray a tension between comprehending this mathematization as proceeding in parallel with physics or through a metaphorical analogy with physics. The limitations in Walras' ability to axiomatize economics reveal a flawed effort to establish the foundations of economics by analogy; this difficulty has persisted through the twentieth century.     

为什么教科书中有关重商主义的流行看法是错误的*

重商主义作为经济思想史教科书的必讲内容,其核心观点长期以来被误读为“财富即货币,货币即财富”,其经济政策体系也被认为是建立在将金银与财富混为一谈的基础之上。本文通过研究原始文献、经典著作以及西方经济思想史学界的最新研究成果,指出教科书中的这些看法是错误的。部分早期重商主义者已经认识到制造业是最大的财富之源。晚期重商主义关注如何通过发展制造业使国家富强。来源于实践经验的重商主义经济政策体系促进了英国崛起,至今仍具有重要影响力。教科书应该尽早做出修正,还重商主义以本来面目。     

International Monetary Reform: A Review Article

Original institutional economics (OIE) has three significant, but apparently contradictory, definitions of institution(s) stemming from Thorstein Veblen, John Commons, and J. Fagg Foster. In this first installment of a two-part paper I address this apparent contradiction by developing an "irenic reconciliation" of these definitions using a methodological approach I call "critical institutionalism"— a synthesis of the OIE in the tradition of the Veblen, Commons, and Foster, the pragmatism theory of Charles Sanders Peirce and John Dewey, the critical realist methodology of Margaret Archer, and the critical realism of Roy Bhaskar. In so doing, I provide an alternative discussion to that of some current institutionalists who propose to replace the existing OIE definitions of institution(s) with "consensual definitions" developed in the discourse with non-OIE traditions. I propose that there is still considerable analytical value in the OIE definitions, and that replacing them with non-OIE-originating concepts would unnecessarily carry OIE away from its methodological and philosophical roots. In the second installment of this paper (yet to be published), I proceed to demonstrate the analytical value these "reconciled" definitions have for the OIE project.